Hella Bus Blog

Check out the podcast of a very interesting, informative, and provocative roundtable on gentrification in Seattle featuring the likes of former mayor Norman Rice, The Stranger'sCharles Mudede, Eric de Place from Sightline, and Richard Morrill a professor of Geography at UW.

Listen to smart, smart people talking about very important stuff here.

You are cordially invited to join the Washington Bus for a summer cocktail reception at the magnificent Chihuly boathouse!Click here for tickets. To RSVP and for more information please contact mallory [at] washingtonbus [dot] org.

Check out this great job opportunity from homies Fuse. Blurb about the position below. Full job description here.

Fuse Communications Hub Director -

Do you believe that more effective communications are critical to increasing public support for progressive goals? Do you have a passion for using earned media, new media, and coalition teamwork to win progressive issue and election campaigns?

Fuse Washington is looking for a multi-talented individual to direct a communications program and media "toolshed" for Washington's progressive social change community. This person will work in a team environment with nonprofit coalitions, ballot initiative campaigns, and staff from Fuse to execute coordinated communications campaigns for top priority issues and elections, and to institutionalize a set of shared communications resources.

Add another chapter to the Bus' party book of records. On Monday, over 200 people crammed into Nord Alley in Pioneer Square for the 2011 Summer Fellows Inauguration. And it was the best! To be topical, the Inauguration was to parties in an alley as zombie ladybugs are to being totally real.

For an easier point of reference, check out this lovely set of photos of the event courtesy of 2009 Summer Fellow Gabe Meier:

Pai's food truck, followed by chocolate cake, followed by immense satisfaction.

Not your average alley party (little to no public urination).

2011 Summer Fellow Paris Randall relaxing.

It was Thomas' birthday!

2010 Summer Fellows Stacy Beull reveals her musical talents.

Sassy bartenders.

Two former Summer Fellows, two State Representatives. A match made in heaven.

Rapt attention.

Huge thank you's to everyone who made it happen - the Pai crew, Seattle Foundation, Brainerd Foundation, Bullitt Foundation, Zeitgeist Coffee, the International Sustainability Institute for the wonderful space, Rep. Eric Pettigrew, Rep. Joe Fitzgibbon, and the whole Bus family that came out to support an amazing group of young people launching their journey to leadership in Washington State!

If you follow local news in Seattle, you've probably seen that King County Executive (and friend of the Bus--both the Hella and the Metro varieties) Dow Constantine proposed a two-year $20 vehicle license fee to prevent major cuts to Metro services. Specifically, 600,000 service hours, or roughly 17% of all Metro Service.

Visualizing abstract numbers is hard. For clarity, Metro has put the effects of a 17% cut in bus service in an understandable context--"the rough equivalent of eliminating all rush hour bus service for commuters, or all weekend service in King County."

Needless to say, that's HUGE. The impacts of such a dramatic cut in service will be felt by bus patrons and those of the car-going variety alike. If you're a bus rider, the effects are pretty direct. Check out the plan for one-sixth of the necessary cuts (PDF--helmet tip to Seattle Transit Blog). Not a Metro rider? According to Metro, buses "carry the equivalent of 7 lanes of traffic on state highways in peak commuting hours." Your commute just got longer.

Thank you map. For enhancing my confusion.

Dow's proposed $20 fee is a fairly straightforward plan to cover the revenue gap and prevent these cuts.

Now $20 may not seem like a whole lot of money. After all, it is about a half of one tank of gas (escalades excluded), or two-tenths of one percent of the AAA's estimated annual cost of owning and maintaining a car--a pretty small amount of money in the grand-scheme of car-ownership.

But those thinking that a temporary $20 car tab hike would be uncontroversial should think again. In order to pass, the car tab hike needs either 6 out of 9 votes on the King County Council, or 5 out of 9 votes to be referred to the voters on the November ballot. There is still a great deal of uncertainty surrounding whether or not the Council will pass the fee directly - Publicola reports that five council members are on the fence - including all four Republicans and Democrat Julia Patterson.

Completely unrelated side note: You can find out who your King County Council person is and what their phone number is here (on the right side of the page). A call from an active and engaged constituent goes a long way towards nudging an elected official in your preferred direction. Whatever that may be.

Whatever happens with the two-year car-tab hike, though, the big picture demands that we find some long-term solutions for Metro funding. Currently, Metro gets the majority of its money from sales taxes (regressive and unstable), and another big chunk from rider fares (which have increased every year since 2008).

It's almost a perfect storm: the recession, rising fares, the fact that people in King County are driving less and less, and the fact that baby boomers are about to hit the age where they have to turn in their car keys. Combine all those and you have an underfunded transit system pushed to the limit. Luckily, there are ideas out there such as the Local Transit Act designed to confront this impending challenge - we'll see how they fare (pun EXPLOSION!) in next year's legislative session. Stay tuned for more!

Last week we posted this astounding photo album from the great Vancouver hockey riots of 2011. Two follow ups that more or less confirm that this was one of the more peculiar riots in history -

1) 90% of the wreckage was cleaned up the next day by 11 am. Almost 16,000 Vancouver residents RSVP'd to join in sweeping up a shattered downtown - some of whom were angry about the riots, some of whom had taken part.

2) Police are identifying perpetrators through Facebook photos. The NYT has the rather creepy lowdown here. This feels like a fairly logical corollary to the public nature of social media and serves as an excellent reminder that when you stare into Facebook, Facebook stares back (thanks Nietzche!).

You met some of them. Then you met some more. Now, check out the third and final installment of 2011 Summer Fellows introductions below. Say hi to them digitally now - then meet them in their full 3-dimensional reality this evening at 6pm in Nord Alley for the Summer Fellows Inauguration!

Alma Garcia Santos

I will be graduating in the fall from Eastern Washington University with a degree in social work and a minor in gerontology. I have 3 younger brothers who get on my nerves sometime like any other siblings. Super excited to what this summer will enrich me with!

Amber RoseJimenez

Amber is enchanted with philosophy and smitten with the arts. She's got mad-rad love for a free press, an informed citizenry, and all-ages, youth run spaces. Plus, she's totally keen on learning about the social & political (sub)cultures within the Middle East and is planning on traversing the region as a foreign correspondent someday soon.

Omar Mozo Olazcon

I got this.

Sug

Sug Haynor is all about glamarchy, dirty feet, overalls, and and micron .005 pens. She/they/squee/ze enjoys long walks on the beach and dinner by candlelight.

Tina Nordquist

Tina has an unhealthy (but not, because it’s awesome) love for voting. She enjoys getting involved with student government and non-profit organizations on the UW Seattle campus, where she studies political science and international relations. In her free time, she finger paints and draws on walls with crayons.

The talented Mr. Joshua Guerci put together this video of us chatting with some of those courageous folks running for Seattle City Council at our kick-off a few weeks ago. Which candidate can name the most neighborhoods? What was the last photo attachment they sent from their Twitter Account? Do they get topical humor? Peep it:

At the riots in Vancouver following their Game 7 loss in the Stanley Cup finals:

Peep the rest of, perhaps the most spectacular photo album in Canadian history here. Seriously, you won't regret it. Police are reporting several instances of officers suffering "human bites," solidarity riots in Montreal, and over 100 arrests. Also, judging by these photos, this wasn't "a small group of hooligans" like the Vancouver Police Chief claimed, but a broad base of (probably intoxicated) devastated sports fans, pyromaniacs, and romantics (see above). Check out the beautiful, hilarious, terrifying, and a little bit heartbreaking photo album here.

It's a three way street, and it's blowing my mind (helmet tip to the Seattle Bike Blog)

Just as Avatar added a new dimension to cinema, bicyclists are adding a new dimension to street use. Previously, the distinction between cars and pedestrians, roads and sidewalks, crosswalk users and people who have to stop for crosswalk users was pretty well-defined. Even if not perfectly practiced, the rules were generally understood.

Now that all of us cyclists are on the road, though, it's a brave new world. Much like the mythical griffin that is part-eagle, part-lion, we exist in a gray area somewhere in between a car and a pedestrian. We travel in the street, and yet are as vulnerable to collisions with cars as pedestrians. When riding in the street, we generally ride in the right shoulder, but take the car-lane when we need to, and sometimes we even ride on the sidewalk. We stop at stop lights (mostly), but treat stop signs like they're yield signs.

As a society, we're clearly in the middle of a sometimes messy, and sometimes heated process of figuring out what the norms of the road are for our increasingly three-way streets chock full of bicyclists.

Publicola recently linked to an insightful Portland Tribune article arguing that bicyclists should be legally allowed to treat stop signs as yield signs. And, as the 'Cola points out, Idaho already allows this. Mad love for Idaho, but who would have thought they'd be leading the way? It's a brave new world indeed.

Some forward-thinking locales--mostly in Europe, as far as I can tell--are even removing traffic signals--the thinking being that in the absence of traffic signals, road users are forced to pay more attention to each other, and be more considerate.

My take on all of this? I'm not sure if I'm ready to remove all the stop lights just yet. But, after years of cycling, I've developed some opinions on what the norms of bicyclist road-use should be. It's totally cool to treat stop signs as yield signs, but be very careful. And, please, don't run red lights--you just look like a dick if you do that. I generally ride to the right, but I will take a car-traffic lane anytime I even vaguely think I need to for safety. And I never, ever ride on the sidewalk, except when I'm absolutely forced to in instances such as crossing the Fremont Bridge. At stop lights, rather than ride all the way to the front of the line of cars, I'll generally take the car-lane because I'm scared of a right-turning car slamming into me.

And in general, the more separation between cars, bicyclists and pedestrians the better. Mad love for bike lanes, the Burke-Gilman and the soon-to-exist Broadway cycle track, which the city is developing in conjunction with the soon-to-exist Pioneer Square to Broadway streetcar line.

I'm actually ridiculously excited for the cycle-track. Check out the plans for Broadway's new look:

Attendees from last month already helped to organize our wicked fun Council Kick-Off with the Stranger, joined us at Sasquatch, and helped hundreds of young Washingtonians pledge to vote. And it only gets bigger and better from here.

Well guess what, it's happening again! Welcome Wagon is the absolute best way for new folks to meet the Bus and see what it is we do, and for Bus stalwarts to usher in another exciting year of good parties and good politics. Come join us this month for more food, drinks, foosball, and opportunities for driving the Bus into a better Washington. It kicks off at 6pm and wraps up (or moves elsewhere, as the case may be) around 7:30. Everyone is invited! Please RSVP to nicole [at] washingtonbus [dot] org!

The Washington Bus presents to you: A great evening, a landmark event, and your golden ticket to a new era of political leadership in Washington state. Of course, we are referring to the 2011 Summer Fellows Inauguration! You're Invited! Seriously! RSVP right now to mallory [at] washingtonbus [dot] org!

The Inauguration will kick off at 6pm in Nord Alley. Exquisite food will be provided by Pai's Food Truck. Delectable drinks will also be available (including alcoholic beverages for those of the 21+ variety). We also look forward to the presence of such stunning elected officials as: Rep. Eric Pettigrew (!), Rep. Joe Fitzgibbon (!), Seattle City Councilpeople Tom Rasmussen, Richard Conlin, and Sally Bagshaw (!!!), Commissioner John Creighton (!), and King County Executive Dow Constantine (!)!

It isn't everyday that you get to take part in launching a fleet of precocious young activists into public life while chowing down on delicious Thai-Hawaiian cuisine and rubbing shoulders with tremendous elected officials simultaneously. Or if it is, I want your life. Everyone is welcome, so please RSVP to mallory [at] washingtonbus [dot] org today! Keep looped in on any updates on the Facebook event page here!

Did Elkfest, Spokane's annual block party, take place a week and a half ago and we are only uploading the pictures now, OR, did the magnitude of its awesomeness warp the fabric of space-time hurling us 10 days into the future making today the first available opportunity to post photos? I submit that the answer can be found below:

The Bus and a local hoodlum. Just kidding, that guy's probably awesome.

Buttons: Bringing people joy since time immemorial.

The best art gallery in a semi we've ever seen. Hands down.Just a small sample of hundreds of Pledge to Vote cards. Also, the ceremonial lollipop marks the beginning of the lesser known Elf fest, where candied treats abound.

The ruptured fabric of space-time. Inside, Elkfest continues to this day.

I knew it! Big ups to the organizers of Elkfest, Nextup Spokane for making moves (You should hang out with them), and all those awesome pledge to voters!